


ZevWarden Week 2017

by greyvvardenfell



Category: Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Drabble, Drabble Collection, F/M, Fluff, Originally Posted on Tumblr, ZevWarden Week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-31
Updated: 2017-08-06
Packaged: 2018-12-10 04:13:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 7,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11683809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greyvvardenfell/pseuds/greyvvardenfell
Summary: A collection of all of the drabbles I wrote for ZevWarden Week on tumblr, following Zevran and Reyja Brosca from in-camp massages to modern tattoo shops to old age by the sea. Chapter titles are the daily prompts I was working off of.





	1. Massage

He starts slow. He always does. How hands that wield blades with such deadly proficiency can also be so delicate and soft, she can’t say. But the silky glide of his fingers across her shoulders chases speculation from her mind, as intended. She looks so tired, he says. Drastic measures are called for.

He murmurs a suggestion and she complies, closing her eyes and slowly releasing the breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding. He smiles. She can feel the curve of his lips as he leans close to kiss the ache at the top of her spine. His breath tickles and catches in the tiny hairs on the nape of her neck, bearing whispered promises and praise as he works his magic on the tension there. Her world narrows until it consists of only him, the press of his warm hands and the lull of his voice and the burst of release as each knot bows to his mastery.

The rhythm of his path along her neck angers a particularly tight muscle and she flinches away from him. He chuckles, low and sultry. “This one wishes to put up a fight,” he says, pulling back to knead more gently over the soreness with his thumbs. “Is this better?”

She struggles to remember what to say, how to answer such questions when posed them. “Y-yes,” she stammers. Her eyes flicker open, but the fire has sunk so low it barely illuminates their tent. She wonders briefly how so much time could have passed, and how he can see to work, then realizes he doesn’t have to: he speaks in touch better than most can speak with words.

“Good.” His voice is soft, soothing. “Please tell me at once if I hurt you.”

“I will.”

He continues in silence, breathing with her. Her eyes close again and she focuses on the motion of his fingers, on the pressure of his legs against hers, on the strength in his lithe body, supporting her as she leans into him. He lingers on her shoulders, chasing away the pain that gathers at the meeting of her neck and back. His hands hold time at bay. She drifts, anchored by the anticipation of his touch.

So absorbed in the minutiae of his movements is she that she doesn’t react as he expects when he finally allows himself to venture lower, tracing the curves of her ribs. But her head tips back and rests on his shoulder as he nears his goal, her beatific smile radiating warmth as surely as her bare skin does. He presses a kiss into the hair above her ear as he folds over her.

“Reyja, _mi amora_ ,” he whispers, caressing the smooth skin of her belly and breasts.

She sighs contentedly and arches into his hands. “Zevran,” she answers, setting him alight. She knows he loves the way she says his name, claims him with her voice. A gentle laugh rolls through her as she feels evidence of his pleased response begin to stir against her back. “Does that mean the massage is over?”

“My dear,” he says, desire darkening his words and kindling a flame of their own deep inside her. “The massage is only just beginning.”


	2. Domesticity

The land around Antiva City rolled like the waves that lapped at its shores. Gentle hills dipped into gentler valleys, terraced by rows of vineyards near the city and wild with olive groves further from its sprawl. Sea salt borne by the constant breeze across sun-splintered Rialto Bay crusted on the windward sides of buildings and trees. North of the city, along the coast, massive white cliffs shrugged upwards, sheer against the water, and, within sight of the fringes of the capital but far enough away to be safe from its intrigues, sat a small cottage, sheltered by an ancient olive tree, at the end of a narrow lane.

Had anyone told Zevran Arainai that, one day, he would be content to live in peaceful domesticity in the Antivan countryside, he would have laughed in their face. He was not a man built for cottages and narrow lanes, after all. The clutter and noise of city life had sustained him through his worst years, haunted him through all his journeys, always calling him back. But the long, bloody disposal of the Crows soured him on it, and after all this time, he yearned for quiet more than anything else. Quiet, and his Warden.

He had feared suggesting that the Hero of Ferelden live outside the country that owed her so much, but, to his surprise, she leapt at the chance. She’d almost forgotten what anonymity was like after twenty years of being recognized as the casteless dwarf who slayed the Archdemon and saved all Thedas. But here, despite the high profile both of them carried as the woman who ended the Fifth Blight and the man who broke the Antivan Crows, Zevran and Reyja found peace. The village nestled in the nearest valley was small, but they could buy what they needed there and rarely had to venture away from it these days.

The two of them had lived together elsewhere, but nothing felt like home the way this airy cottage did. Certainly not the cramped, dilapidated apartment in Treviso or the stark tower suite at Weisshaupt, or even the small tent in which they’d spent night after night as they fled across the Free Marches from the wrath of the Crows. As entertaining as those nights had been, they were fleeting and tainted by fear. Nights in their cottage could be just as fun, Zevran found, perhaps even more so with the knowledge that, come morning, they could stay in bed together, naked and entwined, and watch the sun cast its beams across their bedroom floor. Reyja would sigh happily and curl her pale arm across his chest, and he would lean over to kiss her as she drifted back to sleep. His Warden was still not a morning person, even after so many years. But now she didn’t have to force herself to get up. They had nowhere to be but right where they were.

Zevran had secured this place long ago, before the two of them ventured far to the south in search of a cure for the Wardens’ Calling, though they’d barely settled in before Reyja’s pain grew too great to ignore. By the time their quest reached its end, she was desperately ill, the taint in her blood threatening to make each heartbeat her last. But she begged him to take her back to their cottage in the Antivan hills, beneath the craggy olive older than time. And the tiny vial they’d traveled so far to find emptied gradually as the days dragged them north, and slowly, slowly, the elixir inside brought her back from the brink, and she crossed the threshold under her own power, emaciated and weak but alive. He joined her in the dust left by their absence, wrapped his arms around her, and vowed that their days of roaming anchorless were over. At last.

So far, he’d kept that promise. And if the vestiges of the guild eventually came for him, he wouldn’t run. This was home, truly the first he’d ever known. But though the cottage itself was comfortable, its white stuccoed walls latticed by tendrils of ivy and its wood-bound windows open and inviting, it was Reyja who made this place meaningful. Wrinkles creased the corners of her eyes now, marking how many years had passed since the day he’d ambushed her on orders from the Crows, fully expecting to die but being reborn instead. He counted himself lucky to have watched streaks of gray appear in her short brown hair as his own thinned and receded. Luckier, indeed, than he had any right to be. But he’d learned long ago not to question fate, for better or worse, and, as he and Reyja stood together on the crest of a hill overlooking the sea, Zevran smiled.


	3. Fancy Dress

“Would you stop fussing?” Rica admonished, pulling back from her sister with her cosmetics case in hand. “You’ll only make this take longer, and we’re running out of time as it is.”

“Sorry. You know I’m not used to makeup,” muttered Reyja.

“No, you’re not. But you look stunning. At least you will if you let me finish!”

“Sorry.”

Rica huffed and set to her task again, gliding carefully over Reyja’s eyelashes with a thin brush dipped in kohl. Fine, deep brown powder dusted over her eyelids, setting off the brilliant grey-blue of her irises and complementing the darker blue of her tattoos. Her thick brown hair, pinned gracefully behind her ear where it normally fell across her face, had been coaxed into waves and curls, though she wondered why Rica bothered when it was still so short. Staring at herself in the colossal palace mirror, Reyja hardly recognized the Warden-Commander she’d become under all the work her sister had done.

“There,” said Rica, placing her supplies on the broad marble counter behind her. “What do you think?”

Reyja hesitated. “I feel like I don’t look like me,” she admitted.

“Nonsense. You look beautiful and all of Orzammar will agree. It’s not every day that we get to celebrate something like this, after all.”

“I guess. There are only so many lost thaigs that were once defended by hordes of casteless for me to rediscover, right?”

Rica rolled her eyes. “You know, I thought being with that elf would mellow you, but you’re as sarcastic as ever.”

Reyja’s stomach twisted. Most of a year had passed since Zevran departed for Antiva in pursuit of the Crows, and though he’d sent many letters while she was holed up in Amaranthine, she missed him terribly. No written words could replace the feeling of his hand in hers, or his arms around her waist, or his lips against her neck, or, despite her lover's rather graphic descriptions, any other body part in any other place. She laughed bitterly. “Clearly you don’t know him very well, then.”

“I suppose I don't. You never visit, so why would I?” Reyja opened her mouth to respond, but her sister cut her off. “Nevermind. You need to get your gown on before they come get you.”

She groaned. The gown. It was stunning, low-cut and floor-length, made of silver satin and fox fur, soft and shimmering and utterly foreign, unlike anything Reyja had ever worn before. But it was her right, as the guest of honor at King Bhelen’s banquet celebrating her successful return of the memory of Kal’Hirol’s brave casteless defenders, to wear such a dress, regardless of her feelings on the matter.

Rica laughed at her. Slowly, grudgingly, Reyja dragged off the oversized shirt she’d slept in and set her face to careful neutrality as her sister helped her into the gown. It fit perfectly, sewn by the palace’s finest tailors at the king’s request, and in its perfection, it was all wrong. Reyja was made for armor, for comfortable loose clothing worn soft with use, not fine, rich new dresses like this. Not beauty. Even Zevran had yet to unwind that belief from her mind.

“You look amazing!” Rica cried, clapping her hands to the sides of her face.

“Thanks,” said Reyja blandly, consciously avoiding the sight of herself in the mirror.

“Oh, don’t be like that. Now, we should have just enough time to—” The soft knock on the door of the chamber startled them both. “Shit, they’re early,” Rica grumbled, skirting piles of discarded clothing to greet the royal guards sent to escort Reyja to the ceremony. “I wanted to pick out some earrings for you, but you’ll be fine. Are you ready?”

“Sure.”

Rica shot a glance at her sister over her shoulder before she smoothed the front of her skirt and pulled the door open.

The man waiting in the hall glittered like fire. Pale creamy trousers sat high on his lean hips, meeting a vibrant deep red doublet slashed with gold at his waist and supple tanned leather boots below his knees. Golden earrings studded his long, pointed ears, golden rings adorned each brown hand, and around his neck dripped golden chains like pieces of sunlight he’d captured to sustain himself on his journey underground. His blond hair, grown longer in his time abroad, was plaited elaborately down his back and oiled until it shined like the rest of him. And when he turned at the sound of the door, the grin he flashed at his Warden stole her breath and stopped her heart.

“Zev!” Reyja sprang to her feet and pushed past her sister to fall into her lover’s warm embrace. He laughed. The sound rolled through her, pressed close to his chest as she was, and she reminded herself, perhaps a moment too late, that she would smudge her makeup if she cried.

“Reyja, _mi amora_ ,” he murmured as his laughter died and he took her face in his hands to lift her lips to his. Almost automatically, he began to trace the tattoos on her cheeks with his thumbs. “I missed you.”

Reyja swallowed hard. “Oh, I missed you too, Zev. So much. But what are you doing here?”

“Rumor told me I would find a celebration in honor of the famous Warden-Commander of Ferelden in Orzammar.” Another smile already played behind his bright golden eyes. “I thought I might make an appearance as well, given my, ah, connection to this woman.”

“You came all this way for that?”

“I came all this way for you,” he corrected gently. “As I said, I missed you.”

The kiss that blossomed between them smoldered like the embers of a banked campfire, bubbled like the pools of Orzammar lava far below, flowed like the silky burn of fine Antivan brandy. It closed the gaps the months apart had opened. It made Reyja’s lingering worries over the state of the arling she’d left behind and Zevran’s fear that the Crows would track him even here fade, pale, wash away. Had Rica, standing forgotten in the dressing chamber, not cleared her throat to remind them of her presence, they would have lingered in the glow of it until the cavern itself collapsed.

Zevran laughed and Reyja swore and Rica bit her lip to hide her grin. “My apologies to your sister,” said Zevran, bowing shortly to the red-haired dwarf as she ducked away to rummage through the room for the last bits of her own outfit. “We will have more time, and privacy, after the banquet, yes?”

“I’ll make sure of that,” Reyja said as she reached for his hand.

“I know you will. May I escort you?”

“I’m supposed to wait for the guards, but fuck ‘em. I’d rather go with you.”

He lifted her fingers to his lips and her breath hitched. She’d almost forgotten what that did to her. “As you like. You look very lovely tonight, _mi amora_. Such fancy attire suits you.”

Reyja dropped her gaze from his and glanced back into the mirror she’d been avoiding. “You think so?” she asked softly.

Zevran moved to join her in the reflection and smiled at what he saw. “You are beautiful whether covered in blood, jewels, or nothing at all, my dear. Someday I will succeed in convincing you of this.” He hugged her close and leaned over her to rest his chin on her shoulder, planting a soft kiss on the line of her jaw.

Despite herself, she smiled back. “I love you, Zevran.”

“As I love you, Reyja, my Warden.”


	4. Alternate Universe (Modern AU)

Reyja sighed and leaned against the doorframe, stretching her neck. _Slow night._ They all had been, recently. But the summer air was cool and soothing, the blackness overhead comforting in its empty weight, and it was nights like this that reminded her of the good things about working the door of the Carta Club. She’d rather be out here than inside, among the smoke and the spills and the slurs like Leske, stuck tending the bar.

A whisper of movement at the corner of her eye caught her attention, but it was only the door of the tattoo shop across the street, being closed and locked for the night by a man who waved jauntily at her before disappearing back inside. She blushed and waved back. Despite the darkness, it was a ritual the two of them completed faithfully every night, and she didn’t even know his name. Some day, she promised herself, she would walk into that shop and introduce herself to him. Maybe. When she no longer worked where she would have to see him all the time, just in case she messed it up, like she always did… He was certainly attractive, from what she could gather in the few seconds of him she saw each night: lean, covered in tattoos, long blond hair gathered messily at the back of his head, laughter and light in his eyes visible even from so far away. Her blush deepened and she sighed again, angry with herself. _How could a bouncer be so shy, for fuck’s sake?_

The light in the tattoo shop flickered off and, straining her ears, Reyja heard a back door open and close. _Ritual complete._ Only six more hours before she could return, alone, to her empty apartment for the morning, as usual. She rolled her head back against the rough bricks of the club’s entryway and closed her eyes, letting the calm of the night settle around her.

“A pleasant evening, is it not?”

“What the fuck!?” Reyja’s eyes flew wide and she straightened up like she’d been slapped. Before her, standing in the pool of light cast by the bare bulb above the door, stood the man from the tattoo shop. Ink crept along every inch of brown skin visible under his deep purple v-neck and jewelry dangled from his ears, his eyebrows, his nose, glittering even in the low light. He moved as silently as the setting sun, and he knew it, too, judging by the grin on his face at her surprise.

“Apologies,” he said. “I did not mean to startle you, only to finally break the silence between us. A road is not so great a barrier as to keep us apart.”

Reyja stared at him, more alarmed at this declaration of intent than his sudden appearance. “Um,” she said eloquently.

He chuckled deep in his throat. “Not unless you wish it,” he amended.

“Oh, uh. No. That’s not. Um.” Reyja felt her face afire with embarrassment and was unbelievably grateful for the cool night air. “God, I’m sorry. You did startle me. ‘What the fuck’ was probably not the first thing I should’ve said to you, though.”

His chuckle bloomed into a full laugh and she smiled with him despite herself. It was infectious, the way his eyes crinkled and his full lips parted so invitingly… Reyja blinked in a futile attempt to clear her head as he started to speak again. “It was certainly not what I was expecting, but I must say it was deserved. I should not have surprised you.”

“Pretty sure that’s my bad, actually,” she said, looking away from him. “I’m supposed to be working, not dozing off against a wall.”

“Is this a bad time?”

“No, it’s fine.” Reyja smiled. “You’ll keep me occupied until the rabble starts showing up.”

“I certainly hope so.” He smiled back, dazzling her, and with a start Reyja realized how forward she’d been with him. _Who was this guy, breaking down my walls so easily?_ “But, if I may, business first: where did you get your tattoos? They are quite interesting.” His voice lilted pleasantly in her ears.

“Oh, um.” Reyja looked down at the bold geometry of the designs across her pale, muscular arms. “I’m from Orzammar, and I got them there.”

“Ah, I see. I got most of mine back in Antiva myself.”

“I was going to ask where you were from,” she said, leaning back against the wall again. “I like your accent.” _Fuck, why did I say that?!_

“Most women do. And men. Everyone does, really. I do not blame them.” He shrugged and mirrored her against the other side of the entryway. “It adds to my already-great charm. I am quite handsome, after all.”

Reyja flushed scarlet again and laughed nervously, not knowing how to respond to a (true) statement like that. He tilted his head to one side and eyed her appraisingly. “Well, should you ever desire more ink, I believe you know where to find me, yes?”

“Don’t clients usually come to the artist, rather than the other way around?”

He had the good grace to at least pretend to look chastened. “I… must admit, I have been waiting to approach you for some time. I have never seen tattoos like yours and found myself curious about them. I merely welcome the chance to examine such work more closely.”

She swallowed, hardly daring to believe what she was hearing as her blush spread through her whole body and settled, unbidden, to pulse between her thighs. He gifted her with another grin and she blinked, shifted, tried to gather her speeding thoughts into a coherent response. “Oh, well… I do have a few ideas in mind, to be honest.” _Smooth._ It wasn’t untrue, though the ideas currently floating through her head had little to do with any tattooing he might have to offer.

“I look forward to seeing them,” he said with a subtle wink. “And working my magic on you.”

 _Too late._ “Uh, cool. I’m Reyja, by the way,” she stammered, for lack of anything else to say.

“Zevran Arainai, owner and operator of Crow’s Nest Tattoos, at your service.” She could have sworn he bowed to her. “A rather silly name for a business, I know, but it reminded me of home.”

“No, I like it. It’s good.”

That smile again, as if sunrise had come early. “Good,” he agreed, his golden eyes lingering on her through the glare of the light above them. She felt naked under his gaze, and, to her surprise, reveled in it.

_Good._


	5. Character Development

The dark circles beneath her eyes underscored the lack of sleep Reyja had gotten the night before, with Leske’s cruel final smirk etched onto the insides of her eyelids. She stumbled down the stairs of Tapsters, ignoring Zevran’s call for her to wait, and sat quietly at a back booth, staring at the swirling stone of the tabletop as if it could give her the answers she sought. No guidance came. Instead, the others began to filter out of their rooms to join her, though their greetings seemed to echo down long, empty corridors to reach her ears. Wynne and Leliana went to fetch breakfast, but she shook her head when they asked what she wanted. Anything she ate would have to pass through a maze of knots as hard as the stone around her. It wasn’t worth it.

Zevran slid into the seat across from her and tried to catch her gaze. He bore heavy, tired eyes of his own, and Reyja wondered dully if her restlessness had kept him awake too. She thought it likely, and her stomach gave a small, sympathetic twitch, the most she could manage in her numbness. But she looked down at her lap to avoid the concern creasing his brow. A distant part of her mind rebuked her for shutting him out when he was so clearly worried about her, but she ignored it like she was ignoring everything else. What little energy she had, she told herself harshly, needed to be reserved for the task at hand. They had returned to Orzammar for a reason, and whatever else happened, securing dwarven troops with knowledge of darkspawn could turn the tide of battle when it was most important. Logic could be relied upon, whereas, if what had happened with Leske was anything to go by, her judgement could not.

Leske. Just the thought of his name chipped a crack in the wall she’d built around her feelings. If he, her oldest friend, couldn’t be trusted, could anyone? She surveyed her companions out of the corner of her eye and felt her jaw tighten: Wynne the possessed abomination, Leliana the foreign spy, Morrigan the unrepentant apostate… and Zevran himself, the assassin who had been sent to kill her. If she’d misread Leske, she could have misread any of the people with whom she now found herself traveling. Suddenly, Reyja couldn’t stand to be in their company. She stood abruptly and pushed away from the table, disregarding their startled questions. The door leading to Orzammar’s commons beckoned and she answered its call gratefully.

But she was not alone. A pair of near-silent footsteps followed, Zevran tailing his lover anxiously. It was early enough that the wide cobbled street outside Tapsters was nearly deserted, and as soon as the door swung shut behind him, he called to her.

She wheeled on him with a ferocity he’d never seen from her before, even in the heat of battle. “What the fuck do you want, Zevran?” she hissed. “I thought you were supposed to be good at reading people, but clearly you were lying about that, otherwise you'd know to leave me alone!”

Despite her fury, he reached for her hand. She snatched it from his grasp and took a step back, glaring. “I merely thought I—” he began.

“Yeah? You thought wrong.”

Zevran blinked at her, confusion and hurt and anger warring in his eyes. “You speak as though I have never known betrayal,” he said sharply. "I am familiar enough to say with some confidence that you must talk about it for the pain to ease.”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” said Reyja through gritted teeth as tears prickled at the backs of her eyes. “All I want is to be done with this.” She turned away from him and stared daggers into the stone wall, willing him to leave so she could cry alone, like she always had before. Her heartbeat measured the seconds, pounding at the base of her throat like it wanted to be free of her. She didn’t blame it, but held her breath to keep it inside nevertheless.

But a warm hand touched her shoulder, ghosted down her arm, tightened around her fingers, pulled her into a strong embrace, and she broke against his gentleness. He hugged her closer and guided her into a narrow alley, off the main street and away from any prying eyes as her sobs began to spill from a deep, primal place. Zevran kept one hand on hers and the other firmly across her back as he steered her towards a low crate and sat her down, rubbing soothing circles over her spine as she buried her face in her hands and rocked, powerless in the wake of her own pain.

They sat together until the waves stopped crashing so deafeningly and Reyja could breath on her own again. She pulled her knees to her chest to keep herself together and stared at the ground, her brows furrowed over puffy, reddened eyes. “Why did you stay?” she asked softly, after several more tense, jagged minutes had passed.

“Should I have left?”

“No, I mean… why are you here? With me? What can you—” Her voice cracked and she swallowed hard to smooth the roughness of it. “What can you possibly see in me?”

Zevran leaned forward, peering at her closely. “I am not sure how to answer that.”

“I’m serious, Zev.” She scrubbed angrily at the new tears leaking from her eyes and dragged herself off the crate. “How could someone like you go for someone like me? I’m, Ancestors, I’m fucking worthless. Don’t you see that? I’m awkward and insecure and I make horrible decisions and I will never, ever be good enough for you. And I’m not even pretty, to make up for any of it!” She kicked at the ring of an old barrel on the other side of the alley. “Leske had the right idea, getting out when he did. You should too. Please, go. Find someone worthy of you.” She stopped, slumped against the far wall. “Find someone who won’t lash out at you when all you want to do is help,” she whispered. “I’m sorry.”

He was quiet for a long time, long enough that she started to entertain the idea that he had taken her up on her suggestion without argument. When he finally spoke, his voice shook with the effort of holding back tears of his own. “Reyja, my dear, my Warden.” The crate creaked as he stood and crossed the alley to join her. He took her hand again and kissed her fingers, the inside of her wrist, the bold blue lines of the tattoo on her forearm. He leaned into her and kissed her neck, lifted her chin to kiss the line of her jaw, felt the tracks of her tears on his lips as he kissed her full, flushed cheek. He turned her in his arms to face him and kissed her breathless, closing his eyes and pouring every drop of love he felt for the dwarven woman before him into her like wine, eager to fill the yawning emptiness she’d been so reluctant to bare for him.

“ _Mi amora_ ,” he said as he pulled back from her, words still trembling against the weight of the emotion behind them as his thumbs traced the tattoos on her face. "There is nowhere in Thedas I would rather be than by your side. I am… happy here, with you. Happier than I can ever remember being, to tell the truth. I do not take that lightly. But I swore that I would be your man, without reservation, and if you truly wish me to go, I will.”

“Oh, Zev.” Reyja pressed herself against his chest and sank her fingernails into the leather across his back, holding him close. “Of course I don’t want you to go. I can’t… I can’t imagine doing any of this without you. I don’t know why I even suggested it.” He kissed the top of her head and she sighed. “I’m happy with you too. But I’m so afraid. I don’t know what to think anymore, about myself or us or any of this. Leske…”

“If I could kill him again for you, I would,” Zevran murmured. She felt the vibrations of his voice through his armor and leaned into them, squeezing her eyes shut.

“I know. But it wouldn’t help. I trusted him so much, and just knowing that he would sell me out like that…”

“It will not happen again,” he said, a knife’s sharp edge behind his promise. “I will not allow it.”

“I can’t ask that of you, Zev. It’s too much, too… selfish.”

He frowned, chilled. If either of them had the right to call themselves selfish, it was him, the Leske in his own story. But he shoved the thought away: he couldn’t lose her now, as he feared he would if he told her what he’d done to the last woman he’d cared about.

Reyja drew a shuddering breath, inhaling the spice-and-sweat scent she’d come to associate with Zevran and allowing it to calm her like it always did. “Thank you,” she sighed. “You were right, I needed this. I needed you.”

Her words thickened his chill into solid ice. People didn’t need him. No one had ever needed him. There was no need for a middling assassin, an orphaned elven son of a whore who never knew his father, a tagalong in the company of those with ancient power coursing through their veins on a quest to save the world. But he glanced down into the grey-blue eyes of the woman clasped tight to his chest, and the knowledge that, of all the people she’d encountered to defeat the Blight, she’d chosen to place her trust in him, sent a thread of warmth through his heart. She smiled to see him looking at her, tilted her face up to his for another kiss, and the thread flickered into a candle’s flame. As their lips touched, the flame burst into the summer sun and he thawed, relaxing into her. As much as he feared becoming Leske, becoming Taliesin, Reyja had given him a reason not to. Whatever else he was, whatever he had been, she needed him, and that would be enough.


	6. Family (or lack thereof)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warning: NSFW!

“I don’t even know why Eamon is so gung-ho about this,” Alistair complained, scrubbing hard at the bloodstain on his shirt. “It’s stupid! Even if I do become king, and I’m not saying I will, because who in their right mind would make me king? But even if I did, it wouldn’t matter.”

Reyja bit back a sigh and rolled her eyes at Zevran, working diligently at his own laundry on her other side. Alistair had talked of little else since the arl of Redcliffe made it clear that he intended to put her companion forward as Ferelden’s best choice to fill Cailan’s vacant throne. Zevran smiled and sent a small splash of river water towards her, which sparkled briefly in the noon sun before dousing her thigh. She retaliated, laughing as her lover unsuccessfully dodged her more forceful spray.

“Are you two even listening to me?” Alistair scowled and scrunched the fabric of his shirt in his fist. “I swear, no one listens to me anymore.”

“Oh, Alistair—” Reyja began, turning towards him.

“Apologies, my friend,” interjected Zevran with a grin, shaking his head to scatter droplets of water from his hair. “Why would it not matter if Arl Eamon made you king? Surely anyone would covet such a position of power.”

Alistair’s frown faltered. “They don’t want me on the throne, though, do they? What they want is Maric’s son. A Theirin. The blood of Calenhad the Great. But whether I become king or not, the Theirin bloodline ends with me.” He sighed and looked away over the broad, slow river.

Reyja and Zevran exchanged a glance. “You are a handsome man, Alistair,” Zevran offered, eyeing him carefully. “One day, I am sure you will find a woman who—”

“Andraste’s flaming sword, that’s not what I meant!” Alistair flushed scarlet. “Being a Warden has, well… there’s a reason you don’t often find children in Warden strongholds, if you catch my meaning. Duncan thought it might have something to do with the taint, but we didn’t really get much of a chance to talk about it.”

“Wardens are infertile?” Reyja asked bluntly.

“So I’ve been led to believe. The women especially.” Somehow, Alistair’s blush deepened. “I assume you’ve noticed, um, a lack of, uh… every month? Not happening anymore? Right?”

She had. Her cycle had stopped not long after the Joining, though she’d attributed it to the stress of travel and circumstance at the time and promptly forgot about it when it never came back, with so much else on her mind. “Are you sure about this?”

“I— yes? Duncan made a point of mentioning it when I joined, though I didn’t think it would matter at the time, of course. Does it… bother you?”

Reyja barely hesitated. Pregnancy had frightened and disgusted her deeply as long as she could remember, even more so when her sister was forced to join the Carta, bearing a noble’s son her only prospect of escape. She hated to imagine such a fate for herself. At least Zevran understood her fear, and tailored the time they spent in her tent to accommodate it. But the revelation that the darkspawn taint in her blood could prevent a child from ever taking root within her could change that. At last. Many months had passed since their first night together, and she yearned to finally feel more than his fingers inside her, to explore more than what hands and mouths could do. She felt her skin heat up at the thought and sought Zevran’s hand, and when their eyes met she knew he was thinking of the same thing. But he would never ask, never push. He’d established long ago that she was leading the dance between them, that he would ask nothing more of her than she was willing to give. She was more than willing to give this. “No,” she said slowly, staying locked in Zevran’s golden gaze. “It doesn’t bother me at all.”

The three of them finished their laundry through a haze of new tension, to which Alistair seemed oblivious. Zevran and Reyja lingered close to each other, their fingers and hips brushing as they worked. Alistair talked through the rest of his concerns and thanked the two of them for putting his mind at ease. Reyja promised that she would do all she could to keep him wherever he wanted to be, when he decided where that was. He favored her with his boyish grin as he hitched the ball of laundry into his arms and started back towards the camp, leaving them at the water’s edge.

Zevran waited until their companion's blond head disappeared behind the low rise separating the river from the ring of tents before letting out a long sigh. “As much as I care for Alistair,” he said, rolling his shoulders, “He can be quite wordy, no?”

“He definitely can,” Reyja agreed. “And at the worst times.”

“Mmm." Zevran hesitated, eyeing her before forging ahead. "I wondered if we might find time to—?”

She smiled and leaned close to him, dragging her hand down his abdomen to dance her fingers over the bulge between his legs. “I noticed your, mm, interest quite a while ago. You did a good job hiding it, I think.”

Zevran’s sultry chuckle electrified her. “And I was not even trying to hide it, _mi amora_. Our friend is so very innocent, and I am so very interested.”

“It’s the middle of the day, Zev.”

“There is no wrong time for love-making, my dear. Are you not interested as well?”

“Oh, I’m more than interested,” Reyja said, feeling her pulse in the slickness between her own thighs. “I’ve been interested at least as long as you have.”

“Then let us return to your tent.” Zevran took her hand from his erection and meshed their fingers together, pulling her towards the camp. “We have no other obligations today. And the light of the sun will be welcome, in fact.“ His eyes flashed and he lowered his voice to a rough whisper, close to her ear. “I want to see your face when I bury myself in you.”

The thrill of his words fluttered in Reyja’s belly. “If we’re going to do this, let’s do it right,” she said, her throat tight with anticipation. “I want you to finish inside me.”

Zevran’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. “It would be my pleasure,” he murmured, husky and dark.

“Then let’s go not make a baby, shall we?”

He laughed again and swept her into a passionate kiss, jutting his hips against hers and catching her breathless gasp on his tongue as she felt his insistent hardness twitch. “Your wish is my command.”


	7. Commitment

“You know, we never did get married,” Zevran murmured sleepily, stroking Reyja’s hair as she lay against him in the mid-morning sunlight filtering through the cottage window. They didn’t often rise before noon, choosing instead to linger together in the contentment the closeness of their bodies offered.

Reyja shifted, tilting her head back to peer up at him with her one remaining eye. The final clash with the Crows had left a vicious scar across the right side of her face, bisecting her casteless brand and disappearing into her greying hair. It had taken a long time and many reassurances from Zevran for her to stand the sight of herself in the mirror again. But years had passed since that battle, years of quiet and peace and, for the first time either of them had ever known, the possibility of an untroubled future danced at the edge of each uneventful day. “Do you still want to? It’s been, what, thirty years since you proposed? I love you, Zev. I always will. But do we really need the Chantry’s approval to tell us what we already know?”

He laughed gently and scooted her closer. “Of course not, _mi amora_ ,” he said softly, resting his chin on her shoulder. “But I made you a promise, and I still intend to fulfill it. I wish to stand before the Maker himself and declare you to be my wife, for as long as we remain alive.”

“And beyond,” Reyja whispered.

“And beyond,” he agreed. “I love you.”

“I love you too. And those sounded like wedding vows.”

He only chuckled into her skin again, kissing the meeting of her neck and shoulder. The earring he’d given her so many years before still dangled from the shell of her left ear, its delicate jewel cloudy and the silver tarnished, but the love with which it had been offered stronger than ever. Zevran balanced it on the tip of his finger before letting his hands wander lower, stroking down his lover’s throat and collarbones and breasts, content to let the moment lapse into silence. He ghosted his fingers over her belly, grown full and plump again since the Calling had wasted her away. Though the muscles beneath her flesh had softened, she was still strong, still able to bear her greatsword should the need arise, still Reyja. Still his. He traced the stretch marks down the curve of her stomach until the silvery trails disappeared beneath the edge of the blanket.

She sighed happily and snuggled into his chest. “I mean, it’s not like we don’t have an in with the Chantry. How happy do you think Leliana — sorry, Divine Victoria — would be to see us finally tie the knot? She’s approved since the beginning.”

“Indeed she has. Shall we invite her to officiate? I think she would welcome a chance to escape Val Royeaux.”

“She probably would, wouldn’t she? Especially to come here. She’s never seen our little cottage. Ancestors, it’s been so long. It’d be great to see her again.” A frown creased Reyja’s jagged scar. “I haven’t heard much from her since she told us about Alistair. And Morrigan. And Wynne.” She paused, her eye narrowed and distant. “So many lost… We’re lucky, Zev.” Her voice was barely a whisper.

“I know.“ He kissed her hair and down her cheek and came to rest on her full lips, taking the sorrow from her words. Her eye fluttered closed and she exhaled slowly, turning in his embrace to loop her arms around his neck and push him back against the plush pillows. He ran his hands down her bare sides, kneading the flesh of her hips as she shifted to straddle him. She barely noticed the missing fingers on his right hand anymore, sliced away in the same battle that had taken half her sight. He pulled back, only for a moment. “Will you wear your silver gown for the wedding?” he asked, breathing heavily.

“I don’t know if it even fits anymore. It’s been years since that banquet.”

“And yet you kept it all this time.”

She smiled. “I knew how much you liked it. You couldn’t keep your hands off me the whole dinner.”

“I still cannot,” he admitted as he skated his palms over her stiffening nipples.

“Mmm, I’ll try it on when we’re done, okay?” she promised, arching against his touch.

“Ah, to help my wife into her wedding dress after making sweet, beautiful love to her. Truly, I live a charmed life.”

“You’ve earned it.”

Zevran grinned, curving his scarred hands around Reyja’s thick waist and pulling her flush against him once more. So he had.


End file.
